How to make your website development project successful?

Introduction

So, you want to plan a website development but you don’t know where to start to make it successful?

From the first glance, everything seems to be easy but in reality, successful custom web app development services require many aspects to be done.

In this article, we will take you through the process and advise you on how to approach the website development process, from a more business (and less technical) point of view.

Basics of successful website development project

To make it simple, the success of your project is generally based on top-notch planning and communication.

In other words:

• Understanding – Deep mutual understanding of your business goals, and objectives you want to achieve with your website.
• Plan – A comprehensive step-by-step plan in order to achieve a specific goal, or objective.
• Communication – Restless and interactive communication that will push thing further with no delays.

What threats are linked with the website project delivery?

During this process, you may face some challenges and in general, they are all linked to the three most important points:

• Defining the wrong goals: Do you know exactly who is your intended user? What kind of experience do you want to deliver? Or what exactly do you want to achieve with the website? Should it just give information, or drive sales?
• Choosing the wrong agency: As communication is the key, choosing the wrong agency may lead to delays and general misunderstanding of goals, priorities, etc. We will also talk about this more precisely in the next paragraphs.

• Choosing the wrong technical solution: Choosing the wrong tech stack may be limiting your potential, or be too much and too expensive for your needs.

What makes a great website project?

Stay organized

Setting the goal and expectations

So, before you will start looking for an agency or a developer, get yourself prepared first.

It may be tempting to push ahead and organize things as you go, but good planning may be essential here and save time for both you, and the agency.

From the very beginning, you need to set the expectations you have from your website. In other words – what exactly your website should be doing? – This will be a sort of your navigation and a north star keeping you on track during the entire process.

Defining  priorities

If you have a goal, choosing priorities becomes easier, but you still need to put some effort here.

Mind that different projects require different flows and priorities.

However, a good vendor should be able to explain the process and point out the milestones, and the most important priorities in the project.

Constant monitoring

What will you measure, and how will you make sure you are going in the right direction? How are you going to keep track?

Beginning from regular meetings with your team, through regular updates of the project objectives and priorities.

Relationship with the agency

What to look for when choosing a development agency

If you understand what you want to achieve, it is time to choose a technology partner that will take care of all the technical aspects.

You cannot validate all the agency skills at the first meeting, but it’s really helpful to work with an agency that understands your needs and communicates well.

This is why try to answer:

Connecting on a personal level may give you more self-confidence in communication, and that’s exactly what you want. 

Then, you are much more likely to be understood and you raise your chances of project success.

How to do website project planning?

Project definition

Project definition, in simple words, means setting up what can be realistically delivered.

Create your project definition based on your expectations and requirements. Do it together with your internal stakeholders and your agency as well.

Create your project plan

Without priorities, everything on your list will look equally important, which may raise tensions between members of your team.

Additionally, if something goes wrong, you will struggle to adapt quickly or make an important decision.

In other words, create a “healthy way of development” for your project website.

Use helpful tools, like todoist.

Budget and timeframe

To be realistic, your plan must have a timeframe for each step with an assigned cost. A good agency should be able to come up with a somehow precise plan of action.

They should be able to estimate the time and resources required for each activity in the budget.

Roles and responsibilities

Each task should have a person responsible for it, but on top of that, there should be a project manager (or someone in a similar position) that will stay accountable for the results.

There are many project management software possibilities on the market, that will make this process easier and your agency should have one as well.

Flexibility and compromise

Be open-minded for any kind of compromise and try to be agile in rapidly changing situations. 

Remember that deadlines are not everything.

Sometimes different obstacles appear and some processes are taking longer than others.

Staying agile will most probably make things easier more than being pushy.

Communication and stand-ups

Communication tools and clarity on management

Maintain the flow of information using all kinds of tools. We use Slack, or teamwork.

Remember: the most important role of a good manager is keeping people informed. It is an essential factor in a healthy project.

Stand-ups

Stand-ups are great to control the flow of information and support communication.

This way you refresh the morale of the team, deliver the latest information directly, and you can summarize what has been agreed with your agency or what the next steps will look like.

You can provide stand-ups with various frequencies depending on the volume of your work. It could be: 

• Daily stand-up according to the core web refresh team
• Weekly stand-up setting plans for the next week
• Monthly stand-up according to the organization-wide

Detailed documentation

It’s also very helpful to document every step of your project from start to finish.

If you are going to change something in your plan, you should keep it in your record. This method allows you to come back to your given checkpoint and restore the process.

If the information is archived and there is special access to this you can avoid many mistakes which can be made by your team members. In this way, you are also saving your time and money as well.

Wrap Up

Every project has its ups and downs. Even a perfectly prepared plan will not save you from potential errors. Therefore, make the appropriate assumptions, prepare the team for the project, set a budget time frame, assign specific activities to each person. Monitor the course of the situation and adhere to the deadline.

Just remember that the deadline is not everything, sometimes you need to spend more time which will consume your budget, but the final effect is what counts, do not speed up certain processes even in the case of errors.

Choosing the right agency based on the particular factors guarantees you a strong relationship. This may appear a crucial indicator of the success of your project.